


I've been too long, I'm glad to be back

by nanasekei



Series: Happy Steve Bingo Fills [26]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Light Angst, M/M, POV Outsider, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-09-02 23:51:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16797187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanasekei/pseuds/nanasekei
Summary: In which Joseph White - or Joe, as everyone knows him - is having a pretty regular morning driving his truck and ends up giving a ride to a national legend, along with some much needed advice.





	I've been too long, I'm glad to be back

**Author's Note:**

> For my "Hitchhiking" square on the Happy Steve Bingo! Thanks to Sheron for the beta!

Joseph White – or Joe, as everyone knows him - is having a great day. It’s a sunny and pleasant morning, and he had himself a delicious coffee and a piece of pie for breakfast. The sun hits the road ahead of him, making the empty path seem beautiful.

Joe isn’t a huge fan of hitchhikers. As a truck driver, he runs into an awful lot of them, and he’s had his share of bizarre experiences. Still, he’s never been able to drive past someone asking for help on the side of the road. It just feels wrong. So, when he sees the lone guy signing with his thumb, he immediately reduces speed to stop next to him.

The man is a blonde bearded guy in a hoodie and jeans. Dude is pretty big, which makes Joe a little wary. He knows that’s just an assumption, though – Sarah would tell him to not be so paranoid— so he lowers his window anyway.

The first thing he thinks, catching a glimpse of the man’s face, is that he must be a celebrity, an actor or model of some kind. Then it hits him.

“Holy shit,” Joe says. “Shit— Is that— Is that really you?”

It’s a pretty dumb question, and Joe is sure that if he were by any chance mistaken, he’d seem crazy, but the man just gives him a small smile and nods, so, yeah.

It’s Captain America.

Captain America, asking him for a ride.

Joe, like an idiot, immediately starts looking around, searching for aliens. “What—Why are you here? Is there—Is there something happening?”

The Captain smiles at him. “No, nothing happening,” he says, and Joe immediately feels a little embarrassed. Just because the man fights evil for a living, doesn’t mean evil has to follow him wherever he goes. “I just could use some direction.”

“Sure, sure,” Joe says, probably too quickly, because he’s still taking in the whole _talking to Captain America_ thing. “Where are you headed?”

Captain America steps forward to show him a very wrinkled road map, and Joe tries to pay attention to it, but his eyes keep darting away from the map to the man’s face. Holy shit, _Captain America._ He looks very different with a beard. The hoodie gives him kind of a sloppy look, but something about his presence still imposes respect. Joe is secure enough in his masculinity to recognize the man is a specimen. Also, even if Joe wasn’t, Sarah’s posters of him all over her bedroom wall would be enough proof for him. His daughter has good taste.

“I need to get to Albuquerque.” He points on the map, and Joe nods.

“You need to take this road over here,” Joe says, still nervous. He’d be lying if he said he never imagined meeting Captain America before. He had a few ideas on what to say to him, but now, he can barely stutter out basic words.

“Oh, okay,” the Captain nods and smiles. “Thank you,” he says with a tone of who closes the conversation, and Joe raises his eyebrows.

“Are you waiting for someone?” Joe looks again around him, as if a magical spaceship would somehow appear on the deserted road. The Captain shakes his head. “How are you gonna get there?”

“I was thinking of walking.”

Joe almost bursts out laughing, then tries to disguise it as a cough, to not disrespect the Captain. “You’re gonna _walk_ to Albuquerque?”

The Captain just stares at him, and Joe remembers that, technically, the man can run faster than his truck.

“Well,” he says, trying to recover from the weirdness of talking to a superhuman. “No point in tiring yourself out. Come on, get on, I’ll take you there.”

Captain America’s eyes widen, and he starts shaking his head. “Oh, no, there’s no need--“

“Nonsense,” Joe interrupts him. He’s not a superstitious guy, but right now he’s thinking this might be fate. He wouldn’t refuse a ride to any Avenger, but if there’s one person he owes an entire cross-country road trip to, it’s this man. He opens the door. “Come on, get inside.”

Captain America stares at him for a few moments before finally deciding to get inside.

There’s a moment of an uncomfortable silence, as Joe starts the car again and they pick up the road.

Joe isn’t sure of what to say to start a conversation. There are things he _should_ say, he knows, but it’s hard to get his head in order for them to come out, especially because he’s still having a hard time wrapping his mind around the “national hero and legend in his truck” thing.

He takes a sharp breath. He wishes he could call Sarah. She’d be overjoyed. _Dad, you need to take a picture with him! …Also, ask him if can I meet Thor_ _._

But Joe doesn’t want to ask for a picture. He has a feeling that would make the man uncomfortable, and that’s the last thing he wants to do.

Still, he has no idea how to make small talk with superheroes ( _So, fought any monsters lately?_ sounds a bit strange), so he decides to turn on the radio.

“Anything you want to listen to?”

Captain America gives him a small smile. “Your truck, your pick.”

Joe appreciates that. He turns on his favorite channel, where they play some old classic rock that never fails to make him feel good.

Aerosmith starts blasting in the car. Joe smiles. Good choice, in his opinion.

He sneaks a glance at the Captain, to see if he can get his reaction. Joe wonders what sort of music he likes (imagine being in a concert and seeing _Captain America_ head banging right next to you).

His face doesn’t give anything away, though. In fact, he seems barely aware of the music playing, eyes on the window as the road goes by.

Joe wants to start out a conversation, because the silence is a little uncomfortable (and also because there are things he _must_ say, he will never get this opportunity again), but something in the Captain’s expression doesn’t seem to invite talking. He seems deep in thought, and Joe knows to respect a man’s space.

So he drives in silence, focusing on the music instead. _I don’t wanna miss a thing_ echoes through the cabin, and, if Joe was the type of irresponsible idiot who texts while driving, he definitely would send Sarah a message. He has the feeling that finding out her dad listened to his cheesy old rock with Captain America in the car would make her hilariously annoyed.

Joe’s a good driver, though, so he doesn’t do that. Instead, he focuses on the road. The sun hits the asphalt and makes it glimmer. Above it, the sky is an incredible shade of blue, and Joe finds himself relaxing, almost forgetting about the _national legend_ sitting right next to him.

The song ends, and the next one is a favorite, a classic that he never gets tired of, and he bobs his head along the beat when it starts.

On his side, though, he senses when the Captain stiffens, suddenly attentive. Joe shoots him a glance.

“Not an AC/DC fan, Cap? I can change the channel if you want.”

Captain America blinks and stares at Joe’s radio as if its just given him the meaning of life. He smiles, shaking his head. “No, it’s… fine. Just…” His eyes glimmer in a strange way and he swallows. “Good song.” 

Joe raises his eyebrows. It’s one of his favorites, sure, but even he doesn’t consider _Back in Black_ to be something to get emotional about.

Still, it’s Captain America. Maybe Malcolm Young's guitar brings back some of his war memories. Joe is not going to judge.

“Yeah?” He asks, glad to have an excuse for conversation. “My daughter hates it. She says I’ve got no taste. Keeps trying to get me to listen to those Korean bands of hers instead.”

The Captain smiles, and damn if there isn’t something about the man’s smile that makes Joe feel like his little anecdote matters more than it actually does.

“Sam is a huge fan of those,” he says, and it takes Joe a minute to realize that by _Sam_ he means _The Falcon_.

Joe blinks, trying to imagine the famous soldier and hero listening to the colorful and giddy songs his teenage daughter is obsessed with. He nods, firmly trying to not let any judgment show on his face (who is he to decide what The Falcon does with his free time?) when, to his surprise, the Captain laughs.

“I’m kidding. Don’t tell him I said that,” he says, as if Joe has regular talks with The Falcon or something. “Clint actually does listen to it, and I can’t tell if he does it ironically or not.”

Joe vaguely wonders if Clint means Hawkeye or just some other Clint the Captain happens to know, but then he’s distracted by how relaxed the other man seems now. He falls into silence again, but this time he has a small smile on, and he seems to actually be listening to the music.

For a moment, it’s easier to forget he’s technically several decades older than Joe, and the paternal part of him must yell louder than his “holy-shit-it’s-Captain-America” part, because he can’t help but ask: “Why are you going to Albuquerque?”

The Captain’s smile fades, but he doesn’t look offended, just suddenly more guarded than before. His hands go to his hoodies’ pockets. “I. I might be meeting someone.”

There’s an agitated energy about him all of a sudden, and Joe feels like maybe he should drop the subject, but curiosity gets the better of him. “ _Might_ be?”

The Captain’s jaw clenches. His hand shoots out of the pockets, holding up something that Joe takes a moment to recognize as a flip phone. “I got a message,” he says, as if that explains everything. Then he clasps the phone in his hands, gripping it in a way that seems nervous. “I’m still deciding if it’s a good idea.”

Joe is still a little hung up on the flip phone (and Sarah says _he’s_ old-fashioned; even he has a Motorola), but he frowns at the Captain’s words. “Avengers’ stuff? Sorry,” he adds when the Captain looks at him. “Sorry, shouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s okay,” the Captain says with a shade of a smile. “No, nothing like that. Everything has been under control since the rebuilding.” His voice sounds reassuring, and Joe nods.

“You guys did a great job,” he says, and means it. He’s still not quite sure what happened – Sarah is obsessed with the topic, of course, but thinking about aliens still gives Joe chills, so he doesn’t want to get into the details of everything. He’s still unbelievably grateful he and Sarah weren’t among the disappeared. He remembers watching the whole thing on TV the day it happened – the reporters all at a loss of what exactly they were reporting, cars crashing into each other, people screaming and running through the streets searching for those they’d lost.

Sarah had arrived an hour later, and they hugged each other tightly, like it only had happened once before.

Not everyone was glad when the news that Cap’s crew was back at the Avengers compound, but, honestly, to hell with them, Joe thought. In his opinion, they needed every superhero they could get.

When Tony Stark gave an interview to tell people the fugitives were needed for their plan, Joe was at a dinner, and he got into a huge argument with the regulars because of it. It had been stupid – people were lost and scared and angry, it wasn’t the time to fight, and Joe had never been great at arguing anyway. But he felt that he needed to speak up, to let people know he believed Stark. He trusted Captain America. He trusted all the Avengers.

It was the least he could do.

“Thank you.” The Captain’s voice sounded distant, as if he, too, was getting lost in memories. “But it was a collective effort. Everyone did their part.”

Joe nods. Sarah had been among those who volunteered – her school did a project to help with the clean-up of the wreck all over town. And Joe knows there were others, too – people working overtime to offer counseling, to build fostering homes to all the orphaned children, to donate food and supplies to those who had lost the person who supplied that for them.

When everyone got brought back, there was even more work to readjust. And Joe is pretty certain the Avengers must have been incredibly busy in the past six months.

“So, are you travellin' around now? Earned a break after all that work,” he comments, trying to sound lighthearted to dissipate the heaviness of the memory of the Snap.

Captain America smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Something like that. I… needed to do some thinking.” His hand is back to gripping the flip phone. Joe faintly thinks that, if he keeps this going, he’s going to break it.

“And now you’ve got a date in Albuquerque,” Joe jokes, but the Captain’s eyes widen and his posture tenses.

“I’m… I’m not sure if it’s a date,” he says, twisting the phone in his hands. “I’m not sure if it’s anything, really.”

“Oh.” Joe at a loss of what to say. This morning, the last thing he imagined he’d be doing would be talking heavily personal stuff with Captain America. Still, he swallows, trying to think of some worthwhile advice. “And do you want it to be?”

“A date?”

“Or anything,” Joe shrugs.

Captain America falls into silence. He presses his lips together, looking away. He looks at the flip phone as if it has physically hurt him.

Joe doesn’t have to hold back laughter this time. There’s definitely a story there.

“It doesn’t matter what I want,” the Captain says, his voice firm, but something about his face seems incredibly young and lost, all of a sudden. He looks like a regular hitchhiker now, just another man who had asked Joe for help in the middle of the road, and Joe can’t help but feel a little sorry for him.

“You know,” Joe says, suddenly gaining courage. “My wife was a huge fan of yours.”

The Captain stares at him in silence. He definitely doesn’t miss the past tense in Joe’s sentence.

“She was there,” Joe manages to say, although his chest feels tight at the memory of Beth, of her brown eyes, her loud laughter. “In New York, I mean. She was traveling, visiting a friend.” He smiles a little himself. He can hear it like it was yesterday, her excited voice: _The city is so huge!_ _I saw Iron Man flying above a coffee shop today, and people didn’t even look up! Can you believe that?_ “You pulled her out of a car. Took an alien off her.” The thought still makes him shiver. Beth had sounded so scared, on the phone later, and Beth was never scared. “Black Widow helped her evacuate. But Beth was so glad to see you.” He swallows, other memories flowing – Beth teasing him, telling about how handsome the Captain was, her soft mouth when he shut her up with a kiss. A fond smile curls his lips. “I wanted to… to write you a letter or something. But she was too embarrassed for that, said you probably got so much stuff already. So I never did.”

The Captain stays in silence, watching him. His blue eyes are full of sympathy when he asks: “What happened?”

Joe feels a knot in his throat. “Car accident. Two years later.”

He wants to say something else, but even now, it’s hard to talk about it. The Captain doesn’t push, just nods and waits.

“I thought it was like, fate, when I saw you there” Joe continues, because the earlier memory is easier to grasp onto than the things he can’t talk about – Beth’s pale face in the casket, Sarah clinging to him, going to sleep in an empty bed. “I always wanted to thank you, and… Well, actually, not always. When she was gone, that changed, a bit. I was angry with you – I, I got angry with everyone. It felt like… Like God was playing a trick with me, saving her only for me to lose her again.” His eyes are burning, and he blinks quickly to stop any tears from coming. He won’t cry in front of Captain America, even though he knows the Captain wouldn’t mind. “But now, when I think about it… I’m, I’m so grateful for those two years. I’m so grateful for every extra moment you bought me. Every moment we had together was a miracle.”

Joe takes a sharp breath. He rarely talks about Beth anymore, only with Sarah, sometimes.

He feels a hand on his shoulder, and smiles.

“Didn’t want to get all weepy on you,” he says, voice lighter. The Captain gives him a small smile. “Just thought I—I don’t know. I don’t know what’s the deal here,” he indicates the phone a little nervously. “But every moment matters. At least for me, I—I know it mattered.”

The Captain’s blue eyes go to the phone and he swallows. “You’re right,” he says, and his thumb caresses the phone, which is strange enough to get Joe to give a small laugh.

“So,” he says, pulling himself together enough to give the Captain an honest smile. “Albuquerque, then, right?”

Captain America smiles back.

They fall into a comfortable silence, only the music echoing on the car. Later, when _Hells Bells_ starts playing, Joe can swear he hears the Captain humming along.

* * *

A full year later, Joe is mostly retired. He still loves driving, but the long travels aren’t good for his back, and Sarah worries.

It becomes a funny anecdote in their lives, that one time Joe gave Captain America a ride. Very few people believe him, and no one believes the detail of the flip phone.

It’s a Sunday morning, and Joe’s having some coffee and reading the newspaper while Sarah gets the mail. Her cat, Jungkook, curls in his lap.

Joe is having a nice morning, doing the crosswords and petting the cat, when Sarah walks inside screaming.

“Dad! Dad!” She waves a piece of paper in the air frantically, in his direction, almost accusingly. Joe would complain about her reading his mail, but her face is all flushed and excited. “Dad, you got invited to Tony Stark’s wedding!”

“Oh,” Joe says. He doesn’t keep up with celebrities’ personal lives, and Tony Stark hasn’t shown up much in newspapers or television since he retired. Still, Joe thinks he has a good idea what that means. “Did I?”

“Yes? Yes, you definitely did, it says your name right here, and you can take a plus one, which means I’m coming, and, oh my God, I’m gonna meet Thor!” Sarah actually _jumps_ like she’s thirteen again, and Joe laughs. “I can’t believe you got invited to Captain America’s wedding! And all because of a ride?”

Joe shrugs, unable to stop grinning. “I guess.”

If he gets a chance, he’ll definitely ask about the phone, he decides.

**Author's Note:**

> This one was one of my favorites, haha. Thank you for reading it! Comments and kudos warm my heart. And you know the drill: If you want to, you can [reblog the fic here](http://elcorhamletlive.tumblr.com/post/180673021250/ive-been-too-long-im-glad-to-be-back).


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